What makes a hit a hit? In Hit Makers, Atlantic Senior Editor Derek Thompson puts pop culture under the lens of science to answer the question that every business, every producer, every person looking to promote themselves and their work has asked. Drawing on ancient history and modern headlines - from vampire lore and Brahms's Lullaby to Instagram - Thompson...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2018 WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE The extraordinary and essential story of how China became the powerful country it is today. Even at the high noon of Europe's empires China managed to be one of the handful of countries not to succumb. Invaded, humiliated and looted, China nonetheless kept its sovereignty. Robert Bickers' major new book is the first...

A unique collection of historic recordings in which the last brutal encounters of the war and the mixed emotions of the armistice are remembered by troops from both sides. By the end of March 1918, Germany’s Spring Offensive had thrown British forces back over the old Somme battlefields. But this last push failed and with the stalemate of trench warfare...

As Meghan Markle once said: 'With fame comes opportunity, but it also includes responsibility - to advocate and share, to focus less on the glass slipper and more on pushing through glass ceilings. And, if I'm lucky enough, to inspire.' Inspired by the Royal Wedding on 19 May, this beautiful collection of light-hearted stories celebrates what it takes to be...

*** The Sunday Times bestseller *** 'Vividly imagined and prodigiously researched' Helen Davies, Sunday Times, Books of the Year 'Such a rewarding read' John Preston, Daily Mail, Books of the Year 'This odd, secretive man is brought to life', Robbie Millen, The Times, Books of the Year Maxwell Knight was a paradox. A jazz obsessive and nature enthusiast (he is...

As the Holocaust recedes from us in time, the guardianship of its legacy is being passed on from its survivors and witnesses to the generation after. How should we, in turn, convey its knowledge to others? What are the effects of a traumatic past on its inheritors, and the second generation's responsibilities to its received memories? Eva Hoffman probes these...

Written over two thousand years ago, The Art of War contains penetrating insights into the nature of power, inter-state rivalry, realpolitik and military success, relevant to any age. It was first translated into English in the early 20th century. Sun Tzu's short lines of argument and pithy aphorisms are highly accessible to modern readers, and his text has almost achieved...

'I cannot think of a better biography of a spy chief' Richard Davenport-Hines, The Spectator Sir Maurice Oldfield was one of the most important British spies of the Cold War era. A farmer’s son from a provincial grammar school who found himself accidentally plunged into the world of espionage, Sir Maurice was the first Chief of MI6 who didn’t come...

Lily Cole stars as Helen of Troy, ‘the face that launched a thousand ships’, in Simon Armitage’s vivid, visceral adaptation of Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid For ten years, the Greeks have been laying siege to Troy to win back their abducted queen, Helen. But as the war drags on, and the battlefields run scarlet with blood, the opposing forces...

Jerry White's London in the Eighteenth Century is an unrivalled, panoramic account of the city's dramatic century of rebirth by its leading expert. London in the eighteenth century had risen from the ashes. The city and its people had been brought to the brink by the Great Fire of 1666. But the century that followed was a period of vigorous...

‘An extraordinary book of real passionate research’ Edmund de Waal In 1945, Ezra Pound was due to stand trial for treason for his broadcasts in Fascist Italy during the Second World War. But before the trial could take place Pound was pronounced insane. Escaping a potential death sentence he was shipped off to St Elizabeths Hospital near Washington, DC, where...

This startling book reveals the kernel of truth at the heart of Arthurian legend. Blake and Lloyd prove that Arthur was a real Dark Age warrior, with an extensive network of family, mistresses and foes, whom they name and locate, using geographical evidence and source material. They pinpoint the battlegrounds where he campaigned, explain who he fought against and why,...

In the annals of espionage, one name towers above all others: that of H. A. R. Kim Philby, the ringleader of the legendary Cambridge spies. A member of the British establishment, Philby joined the Secret Intelligence Service in 1940, rose to the head of Soviet counterintelligence, and, as M16's liaison with the CIA and the FBI, betrayed every secret of...

Acknowledged as a masterpiece of materialist criticism, this book delves into the complex ways economic reality shapes the imagination. Surveying two hundred years of history and English literature – from George Eliot to George Orwell – Williams provides insights into the social and economic forces that have shaped British culture and society. Provocative and revolutionary in its day, this work...

LONGLISTED FOR THE GORDON BURN PRIZE 2017 A hauntingly beautiful social history of the Thames Estuary, from the author of On Brick Lane Out at the eastern edge of England, between land and ocean, you will find beautiful, haunted salt marshes, coastal shallows and wide-open skies: the Thames Estuary. The estuary is an ancient gateway to England, a passage for...